When being asked to lend money

One thing that quite upsets me is when us Aspies get asked to lend other people money under the false pretense of possible friendship, then we don't get it back. This happened to me more in my early teens up to my mid-20s, but I fell for it less and less. I'm actually pleased to say that there were more times where I did lend money to a friend and got it back soon after.

I imagine this has happened to NTs as well who are caught in the "social crucible" of youth, but not as frequently as us.

There are four events of money-lending w/o return that I can recall; two of which were early teens and involved other guys, the latter two were in my mid-20s and involved young women. The first two were borderline extortion.

1) When I was 13, one guy in the class called Kevin kept asking me to borrow small amounts, like $2 here, $3 there, and I did this like four times, setting a precedent before I finally clamped down...the guy had the nerve to tell me that "I already paid it back, don't you remember?" when I called him on the previous "loans". He got in my face at one point and said threateningly don't you want to be a good friend then I yelled at him and it got into a bit of a shoving match before teachers sent us to the principals office.

2) At 14, I had a fake friend who asked for $5 which he didn't pay back, and knew I wouldn't get it back once I noticed $40 missing from what my grandfather gave me for my birthday, right after I invited the guy over.

Fast forward to young adulthood...and a couple of tricky ladies:

3) At 26, I had a female friend who initially I dated but we decided to be friends, we just hung out occasionally, and one day after she wouldn't return my phone calls for like two months, she calls me up saying there's an emergency, her roommate kicked her out, and she needs $50...I obliged (lucky I had a good IT job and an inheritance)...and being a naive fool, I called her every 10 days for a month asking for it back, and never heard further - I should have clued in that she wasn't contacting me for two months before the "emergency"...

4) At 26 again, I went out to a club with a couple of friends, had some drinks, met up with a cute girl who started making out with me on the dance floor and we left together...spent the night at my apartment...and in the morning she told me that she needed about $15 for a cab to get home - I got suckered by looking into her big green eyes and gave it to her...it didn't occur to me till after that there was a bus line nearby...but heck I guess protocol dictated I had to be the gentleman

My late grandfather, who gave me that stolen gift and eventually an inheritance, gave me the greatest gift of all when I asked him for advice on dealing with people who insist on "lending" them money: just tell them that I don't have it. (Almost as simple as Nancy Reagan's advice "just say no" LOL!) Of course, many of them will get skeptical...but in any case...If somebody's broke or in dire straits I'm pleased to help them out where I can, provided I've got the means, I just get p***d off if they deliberately plan to rip me off under false pretense, like a con artist.

People who are narcissistic or sociopathic tend to be manipulative all the time. But what's worse is that they naturally gravitate socially towards people who they feel they'll be able to manipulate most easily, which includes people with cognitive conditions. Many sociopaths either bully or trick these people into doing their dirty work for them.

So that's really what you're probably running into: bad people gravitate towards naivete, and we tend to express that more than most because of our tendency to want people to be straight with us.

My oldest brother was at the bank one day to borrow something like $20,000 for farm equipment.

He had to wait to speak to the banker because another customer was talking to the banker. He could hear the conversation.

The other customer repeatedly asked for a loan of about $2,000 and the banker kept saying, "We don't have that much available at present."

After the other customer left, my brother went in and said that since they didn't have $2,000 to lend then he might as well not even ask for the $20,000 he needed. The banker replied with something like "Every time he asked for the money and I said 'we don't have that much at present', I added "to lose" under my breath."

There's a woman that I know who's swindled a lot of money from one of my two friends. Several years ago she asked me if I could lend her $25 and I told her, no.

I know a guy who got hooked up with some woman in Houston years ago and basically gave her everything he had. Then when his parents died and he inherited some good farmland, he sold that and gave her the money, too. All he has left now is the old farmhouse and a minimum wage job.

I used to loan small sums in high school. after a bit I started charging interest (which was hilarious) and most people actually paid it back or paid it back with interest. At some point a long time aquaintance asked me for 5,000$. I have no idea what he wanted with the money but I decided if it was that important he would be able to jump through some hoops.

I told him if he really needed the money he should get a loan from a bank, but that if was having trouble we could go over his finances and work out how much he could afford to pay back and I wouldn't charge him interest. Eventually I told him "look dude I'm not going to just give you 5K, if you need help that's one thing but otherwise it's just not happening."

I remember when I was 7 years old we had one of those 'chocolate' boxes (in this case it was Minties) to sell for fundraising at school. It was my older sister's box, but she bullied me into helping her sell them. A girl, a bit older than me, came up to me and said that she didn't have money on her, but promised to give it to me the next day. I took her at face value and gave her a box. She never gave me the money and I had to pay for it from my own pocket. I remember loaning small change to a friend at 9, she never paid me back. I remember loaning a new CD to a high school friend, she returned it after I asked for it back, but it had a huge scratch on it. I stopped giving things to people I didn't know well early, but it took time (mid-teens) to stop doing things for friends. And I have to limit how much I help family - my sister is the worst because of her unresolved 'trauma' and anxiety issues. She was non-functional for a few years (and no she does not have Asperger's).

I also remember a few incidents with thieves. In primary school (age 9) I caught a girl in the year below me rummaging through my bag. Before school started all the kids dumped their bags outside the classroom doors and went off to play. I am certain she was looking for something to steal from peoples bags. Her bag would not have been with my classmates bags. My friend was with me and she accompanied me to the teacher on duty to inform them of the thief. The girl was sent to the principals office and I think she was let off with a warning. Her stupid infuriated older sister came up to me and starting screeching at me about how her sister was not a thief (what a delusional or lying cow).

In William Shakespeare's play "Hamlet", Polonius is speaking to his son Laertes who is leaving to go to University in Paris (Act 1, Scene III) when, in the course of giving him advice on how to live and behave himself while abroad, he says ...

"Neither a borrower nor a lender be;For loan oft loses both itself and friendAnd borrowing dulls the edge of husbandry."

Only had an incident like this once - it involved a male friend who lived on the other side of the country, and the short version is that he got really upset when I told him that I couldn't afford to keep helping him out financially, especially since he wasn't paying me back or even talking about that. (the guy had some issues with depression and drug usage)

Only had an incident like this once - it involved a male friend who lived on the other side of the country, and the short version is that he got really upset when I told him that I couldn't afford to keep helping him out financially, especially since he wasn't paying me back or even talking about that. (the guy had some issues with depression and drug usage)

Now that you mention it ... there does seem to be some kind of correlation between financial dependency and alcohol/drug dependency ... and teen pregnancy ... and low intelligence ... and violent activity ... and criminal convictions ... and dropping out of school ... and an overall lack of ambition ... and ... and ... and ...

Only had an incident like this once - it involved a male friend who lived on the other side of the country, and the short version is that he got really upset when I told him that I couldn't afford to keep helping him out financially, especially since he wasn't paying me back or even talking about that. (the guy had some issues with depression and drug usage)

Now that you mention it ... there does seem to be some kind of correlation between financial dependency and alcohol/drug dependency ... and teen pregnancy ... and low intelligence ... and violent activity ... and criminal convictions ... and dropping out of school ... and an overall lack of ambition ... and ... and ... and ...

Sad thing was, this was NOT a guy with low intelligence, he was just making some poor choices at the time. And admittedly, I don't know for certain he was using drugs again when I was lending him money, just something mutual friends had suspected)